Page 4A
East Oregonian
Friday, January 19, 2018
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
Founded October 16, 1875
Tip of the hat,
kick in the pants
■ A tip of the hat to action this
past week to improve mental health
services in Eastern Oregon.
Spurred in part by concerns raised
by law enforcement professionals
throughout the area, Greater Oregon
Behavioral Health Inc. (GOBHI)
put Lifeways Inc. on notice for what
it called substandard mental health
services.
GOBHI CEO Kevin Campbell
requested that Lifeways hire an outside
consultant to oversee the program and
help make necessary improvements.
The first meeting between the two
organizations since Campbell went
public is scheduled for Friday. It’s good
timing because Lifeways is welcoming
a new CEO, and may have a window
to make some long-overdue changes to
policy and personnel.
We don’t know what will come out
of these new plans and demands, but the
fact that mental health services are being
talked about and wrestled with publicly
is a step in the right direction.
Refocusing law enforcement,
the medical community and local
government on the importance of
this issue is critical, and we’re happy
that services here are going under the
microscope.
■ A kick in the pants to how low
Donald Trump has dropped the
expectations of moral conduct of the
President of the United States, and for
those who don’t seem to care.
Share this list with your 2015 self and
see if it matches your expectations of
the presidency. He has cheated on all his
wives, judges everyone — even his own
children — by their appearance, has
no friends, lies about giving money to
charity, insults everyone, etc., etc.
The report this week in the Wall
Street Journal that Trump cheated on
his wife, first lady Melania, in 2005
just months after she had given birth is
only the latest revelation in the tabloid
presidency. The woman in question
is porn star Stormy Daniels. Trump’s
lawyers paid her $130,000 during the
election not to tell her salacious story to
the media. Since that payment, Daniels
denies the tryst ever took place.
That the escapade barely raises
an eyebrow is a marker of just how
salacious the first year of Trump’s
presidency has been. That a U.S.
president cheated on his wife with a
porn star, paid her to shut up about it
and faces no repercussions is quite a
realization.
For many, these misdeeds are worth
looking past, because of Trump’s
un-Hillaryness. They’ll even pull out the
quick Clinton equation — Bill did the
same thing, right?
But Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica
Lewinsky and his blatant lie about it was
the sole focus of the media for months.
It brought about impeachment. And
“I did not have sexual relations with
that woman” stands next to Nixon’s
“I am not a crook” as the epitome of
presidential lies. We didn’t accept either.
For some reason, we’ve lost our will
to stand up to such garbage.
The people who support the president
should realize that they are making
themselves and the country susceptible
to equally odious moral leadership (from
both sides of the aisle) in the future.
OTHER VIEWS
What we can learn
from ‘s-hole’ countries
D
YOUR VIEWS
Oregon cap and trade bill
will reduce greenhouse gases
Soon the Oregon Legislature will be
considering the Clean Energy Jobs bill. In
a nutshell, this policy will provide a cap on
pollution developed with the best science
available and allowing a pricing schedule
that is reasonably stable and flexible through
time. The proceeds will be invested into
clean energy and sustainable projects
throughout all social, economic, and cultural
strata. A minimum of 35 percent of proceeds
will be invested to reduce pollution and
climate impacts experienced by low-income
and rural communities, communities of
color and workers in Oregon. I urge you
to become informed on this timely and
important bill and then actively support it. I
feel it moves Oregon and the nation toward
addressing reduction of greenhouse gas
emissions — a necessary first step if we are
to provide a future climate on Earth wherein
humans may thrive.
Carbon pricing has a lengthy history in
Oregon dating back to 1997; therefore, the
current legislature has access to sufficient
information and available expertise in the
field to analyze this approach known as a
cap and invest. Oregon would be joining
several other states in greenhouse gas
reduction efforts. Knowledge gained by the
states will guide development of national
models for carbon pricing and resulting
greenhouse gas reduction efforts.
At this point in time any delay adds to
the cost and difficulty of implementation
necessary to achieve the required reduction
trajectory (another term to become familiar
with — ask your senator/representative to
explain the concept).
There is always uncertainty regarding
effectiveness of any legislation but in this
case the more troublesome uncertainty is
how our climate responds to inaction. You
must not think of this as Oregon acting
alone and having little global impact but as
Oregon trying to influence national efforts,
which will have tremendous global impact
on climate change.
Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the
East Oregonian editorial board. Other
columns, letters and cartoons on this page
express the opinions of the authors and
not necessarily that of the East Oregonian.
It is the job of elected leaders to inform
their constituents of potential threats to
our way of life; unfortunately this has not
happened. I find it worrisome that they have
had annual briefings on this for decades
and are unwilling to start a dialog with
us regarding solutions. Please take a few
moments to learn about the Clean Energy
Jobs bill and let your leaders know that you
are holding them accountable.
Charles LeBold
Union
Plenty of people read
nutritional labels
I’m surprised and disappointed at the
East Oregonian’s view of the need to
“plaster” labels on food products. I think
you’ve underestimated and misunderstood
your readers’ opinion of the importance
of nutrition labels. More people than you
think want to know what they are putting
in their bodies.
You said that you “believe most
consumers primarily rely on another label
— the price tag — more than all the others
combined when they decide what to buy.”
I can’t believe that you would base your
opinion on a belief rather than research.
According to the FDA, half of all adults
“always” or “most of the time” read the
nutrition facts label. Thirty-nine percent
“sometimes or rarely” look at the label,
and 10 percent reported “never” reading it.
These results seem more in keeping with
what I’ve noticed anecdotally.
If people don’t want to read the
labels, they don’t have to. Personally, I
like comparing the amount of sodium,
cholesterol and sugars in food products,
and yes, I like to know from where the
food originated. Then, I’ll look at the price.
Maybe I’ll pay a little more for something
healthier. Maybe not. But, at least I have
the option of knowing what I’m buying and
where it came from. Apparently, half the
population feels similarly.
Connie Macomber
Pendleton
espite President Donald
babies are exclusively breast-fed
Trump’s reported call to
for the first six months of life, the
reject immigrants from
figure is 42 percent in sub-Saharan
“shithole countries,” people from
Africa. In Rwanda, it’s a stunning
these countries actually have plenty
87 percent.
to teach us.
6. African governments
Let’s start with a quiz: Which
have conscientiously followed
country was the first in the world
recommendations of the World
to ban government discrimination
Nicholas Health Assembly to curb infant
against gays in its constitution?
Kristof formula marketing that discourages
Norway, New Zealand or South
breast-feeding; the U.S. has not.
Comment
Africa?
In this respect, suggests Shawn
Answer: It’s the so-called
Baker of the Bill and Melinda Gates
s-hole country, South Africa. It also bans
Foundation, “The U.S. might benefit from
discrimination based on gender and
technical assistance from Botswana.”
disability. Someday all the world will be so
7. Nigeria ensures that 93 percent of
enlightened.
households get iodized salt, to reduce iodine
Here are other examples we can learn
deficiency that causes mental disability
from:
as well as goiters. In the U.S., only a bit
1. Sierra Leone’s president has
more than half of salt sold to households is
committed the country to providing free
iodized, and iodine deficiency is becoming
health care for children under 5 and for
more common.
pregnant women, including prenatal care
8. At a time when much of the rich world
and deliveries, although care still lags.
has turned against refugees, Uganda has
Meanwhile, in America the issue doesn’t
quietly accepted more than one million
get such high-level attention, so American
South Sudan refugees. Likewise, the
women die in childbirth at five times the
Diffa region of Niger is heroic in taking in
rate of British women.
refugees from northern Nigeria, and it now
2. Kenya is way ahead of the U.S.
resettles refugees at extraordinarily high
in mobile money. It’s easy in Kenya to
rates, helping the newcomers rather than
transfer money by cellphone and to use a
demonizing them.
phone as a bank account. Nearly everyone
9. In the latest Freedom House index,
has a mobile phone, and 88 percent of
the U.S. fell in the rankings of freedom
Kenyan mobile phone users also have
and democracy and is now outranked
mobile money accounts. Kenyans don’t
by two African countries, Cape Verde
understand why Americans are so backward and Mauritius. Both manage multiracial
in telecommunications.
societies in a way we can learn from.
3. Rwanda may eliminate cervical cancer
10. The fastest-growing economy in the
before America, for Rwanda vaccinates
world is Ethiopia’s, according to the World
virtually all girls against the human
Economic Forum, with Tanzania’s and
papillomavirus, which causes cervical
Djibouti’s also in the top six. They are all
cancer. By also employing screenings for
growing more than twice as fast as the U.S.
older women who were not vaccinated, it
economy.
aims to eliminate cervical cancer by 2020.
11. The Trump administration could
In contrast, only 65 percent of American
learn something about diplomacy from
girls get vaccinated for HPV, and a woman
Botswana, which asked the U.S. to
dies every two hours in the U.S. from
please clarify whether the U.S. considers
cervical cancer.
Botswana a shithole. No bluster, no military
“I wish parents in the U.S. worked
threats, no rude tweets — but the point was
as hard as those in Rwanda to get their
made.
daughters vaccinated, so that they will
12. Immigrants to the U.S. from Africa
never need to know the horrors of cervical
show a passion for education that can
inspire us all. Sub-Saharan African-born
cancer,” says Dr. Seth Berkley, chief
immigrants are likelier to earn a college
executive of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance.
degree (39 percent) than native-born
4. Understanding the importance of
Americans (31 percent).
languages in a globalized world, many
“Africa, like any continent, has its
Kenyans speak English, Swahili and a
problems,” notes Ken Roth of Human
tribal language, and polyglots are common
Rights Watch. “But it also has its areas
throughout Africa. In contrast, there’s the
where it excels. We diminish ourselves
old joke: If somebody who speaks three
when we dismiss entire nations with an
languages is trilingual, and one who speaks
two languages is bilingual, what do you call epithet rather than open ourselves to the
positive examples they set.”
someone who speaks one language? An
■
American.
Nicholas Kristof grew up on a sheep and
5. African health officials have strongly
cherry farm in Yamhill. Kristof, a columnist
promoted breast-feeding to make sure
for The New York Times since 2001, won
that babies get the healthiest possible start
the Pulitzer Prize twice.
in life. So while 20 percent of American
The East Oregonian welcomes original letters of 400 words or less on public issues and public policies for publication in the
newspaper and on our website. The newspaper reserves the right to withhold letters that address concerns about individual
services and products or letters that infringe on the rights of private citizens. Letters must be signed by the author and include the
city of residence and a daytime phone number. The phone number will not be published. Unsigned letters will not be published.
Send letters to managing editor Daniel Wattenburger, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com.